If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

The dark & dirty side of retriever training

To combat the boredom of no significant training & watching skies devoid of ducks, I decided to write a tell all post about the dark side of retriever training. Moderators please delete if this is too graphic or too much information for the average dog trainer.

What topic did I choose? The use of ratshot, cattle prods, sling shots or BB guns. No those don't even compare to the true dark side. What about the early collars that could have powered the electric chair or at least a travel trailer for the weekend. Nah that is merely childs play compared to the topic I chose.

The topic I chose has the fairly innocent name of duck freezer. It is a necessary evil for those of us that want to use ducks when training. A hunting retriever picking up ducks & pheasants is certainly more natural than retrieving oblong cylinders made out of cheap plastic. So when my lovely wife decided she needed a new side by side fridge & freezer I happily bought her a new one. As I moved the old, worn out freezer to the basement, I was one happy dog trainer. Now I could store ducks in the freezer & keep them cool between training sessions in the refrigerator section.

This system worked like a charm. I would pull frozen ducks out & use them. At the end of training they went in the fridge. Little did I realize the evil I had allowed to enter my life.

All went well for years lulling me into a false sense of security. Then it happened. I got the call at duck camp from my wife. "Something is dead under the house" followed by "when are you coming home?". I had planned on staying 2 more days but decided "tomorrow" was the right answer after some persuasion. She was planning a stay at the most expensive resort in driving distance until I remedied the problem.

As I hunted the next morning I got the dreaded call. "Your duck freezer has died"! As most trainers I know use second hand freezers for this task I knew several that had experienced this. Their previous descriptions of the odor caused cold chills to shoot down my spine. I quickly made my excuses & went home to deal with the carnage.

Upon my arrival home the house looked like some Satanic ritual was taking place. Candles were lit everywhere. I had never seen so many Glade plug ins & those twist open air fresheners in one place. There were also cans of Fabreze on every flat surface. All I could smell was candles & air fresheners. Maybe I had showed up before disaster.

As I walked over to the basement side of the house, I first smelled the evil. I gagged. Now for most that may not mean anything. Those that have trained with me will begin to understand the true complexity of the odor. I train with ducks for 2 weeks after most would have discarded them. My reputation for skanky training ducks is legendary in the Southeast.

As I descended into the basement the smell got worse. The agony of hell was becoming clear. I threw open the door to the basement and immediately lost my lunch. As I opened the freezer door, I had to revisit the outdoors. Anything I had eaten the last two days was displayed in a large puddle immediately outside. Thankfully cleaning up the vomit kept me from the task at hand.

Now a tutorial for those who think a broken freezer simply stops cooling. No it heats the contents in a closed space & allows it to fester in its own juices. Ducks being smelly creatures to begin with, receive no benefit from an unspecified time period in such an environment. The juices that escaped when I fully opened the door caused yet another round of dry heaves.

There are simply no words to describe the aroma. I already had cotton soaked in mouthwash in my
nostrils but it overpowered that with no effort. Breathing that scent for a prolonged period could easily induce suicide. Burning down the house seemed a perfectly legitimate solution at the time.

With no sunshine it seemed a perfect time to provide a warning for the uninitiated. Unfortunately the temptation proved too strong & I had my new duck freezer delivered last week. Evil is hard to resist!

He had a nice set up, cold drinks, snacks, tv. He was loving life. Until... one day he opens the fridge and finds DUCKS!! Are you f...n kidding me. He would not touch that refrig/freezer again & that unit was not cheap.

When Hurricane Sandy hit, well that unit was half way under water. Weeks later I myself had that daunting task of dead duck removal and having to smell that wicked odor.

Like you.. he he I now have my own dedicated duck freezer in his man cave. Sad for him, nothing. Evil I tell ya!!

LOL. I threw up a little bit just thinking about it. One of my many weaknesses for being a retriever person is having a weak gag reflex for bad smells. There are folks I can't train with and sorting birds at the end of a trial or HT day will make me boot.

The freezer in our garage doesn't hold a lot and it is older than me--it was made by General Motors--but seems to be indestructible. Regardless if the same thing happens, I am calling 800-GOT-JUNK to haul it all away.

Our version / neighbor that watches the farm calls one summer day when we were far far away. " someone may have died inside" were the first words i heard. After assuring them that was unlikely more investigation occurred. It was the bird freezer that had a smell. Good neighbors they were. Duct tape and a strap to keep all closed. Tractor with forks came and the smelly rascal went to the burn pile with matches.

Now that type of storage unit sets outside under cover where a tractor had easy access

Fishduck if you ever give ip the day job maybe you make it ad a writer
Dk

I haven't been able to keep ducks, because we didn't have space. The old chest freezer has so much fishing bait in it and I can't find the ducks when I put them in there. I think I've found a spot now, since we moved out of our camper in the shop, there is a beer fridge in the shop with a freezer on the top that isn't being used for anything else. Now I just need to find someone with some surplus frozen ducks.

Paula

HR Dixie's Southern Comfort IV, MH

“The beauty of the Second Amendment is it will not be needed until they try to take it.” - Thomas Jefferson

The story of the failing freezer definitely touches my memory. We were using an old freezer in the garage for our duck stash and a couple of years ago we had a power outage in the middle of the summer for 3 days! Not good. Even though we went to the freezer and cleaned it out after a day and a half, the freezer was toast! It was way too stinky regardless of the many disinfectants used to ever rise again. The failing freezer is always my biggest fear! I can take floods, earthquakes, fires, etc., but please not the duck freezer!